MARIJUANA MUDDLE

ONTARIO taxpayers will be paying the cost of a superior court appeal at the
end of this month because the federal Liberals have continued to fiddle and
fuddle on marijuana laws.

Indeed, one could argue that many of the minor pot possession charges that
continue to be the huge majority of drug prosecutions dealt with by Canada's
various courts since July 31, 2000 have been a waste of taxpayers' money.

That was the date that the Ontario Court of Appeal unanimously confirmed an
earlier trial court decision in favour of legal access to medical marijuana
and, by doing so, invalidated the prohibition of marijuana in the Controlled
Drugs and Substances Act. The ruling was set aside for one year in an
attempt to get parliament to formulate new laws on access to marijuana for
medical needs.

But the Liberal cabinet chose to issue regulations rather than actually make
a decision about what it was going to do with its pot laws. Because there
has been no new law, an Ontario youth's lawyer is arguing that Canada's
marijuana possession laws have been found invalid in court and have no force
- - an argument that the Justice Department would like to refute on appeal for
fear of seeing hundreds of similar charges tossed out of court across
Canada.

This whole costly mess could have been avoided had the Liberals followed
through on earlier promises to legalize adult possession of small amounts of
pot, a change that polls show the majority of Canadians want.